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About Sexual Objectification on the Streets

A few weeks ago, Heartless Doll sent us a post via Twitter by Andrea Grimes. After reading the New York Times article on the prevalence of sexual objectification in Italy, Andrea writes about how women are sexually objectified everyday on city streets. We love what she has to say and we want to hear your thoughts as well.

Today’s New York Times article on the sexual objectification of Italian women got me to thinking, not only about sexual objectification in media, but about sexual objectification on the street, in everyday life.

Growing up in the suburbs in Texas, I’d only seen cat-calls on television; I figured that, like sex that doesn’t result in STDs or babies, cat-calling only happened on TV. As soon as I started school at NYU, however, I learned that cat-calls are part of a female city-dweller’s way of life. I traveled as well, and it was wonderful. But whether I was in New York, Paris, London or Berlin, the calls came all the same.

I think I brushed it off at the time, saying something along the lines of, “Well, what do I expect, an American girl trotting around like I own the place? I’m asking for it!” Which is saddening to think back on, of course, because nobody is “asking” for sexual harassment, regardless of how young and taut and blonde they might be.